On Madam and the Universe

It's strange that I don't write that often about Madam, considering that she's so central in my life. Part of it is that I have not yet mastered the gift to converting our little inside jokes and outings into stories that would interest anyone except immediate family. Also, whenever I am inclined to complain about tantrums, etc, I like to take a little time to let those particular feelings blow over. So I end up not writing much at all.

But, honestly, the main reason is that I am waiting for the day that I can write about all of the cute things she says.

We're not there yet.

I've mentioned that Madam is having speech difficulties, yes? After some dithering about whether or not to screen her for possible intervention, we finally decided to go forward and test her.

It's a peculiar feeling, watching someone test your child. I was sitting on my hands the whole time, to keep from jumping in. I wanted to pass Madam a cheat sheet, or something. I wanted to tell the nice tester that “she KNOWS this, no really...she does.” Mostly, I managed to behave (although I may have blurted out an answer or possibly two). The whole thing was complicated by the fact that Madam is EXTREMELY shy around strangers, thus, I could barely get her to say ANYTHING to the teacher, or to follow her directions. It took a very long time for her curiosity to overpower her foreboding.

I knew the tester was not getting an accurate picture of Madam. But there was no way for me to prove it.

She's gotten evaluated a few more times since then, and while now she can say some words, they're pretty much unintelligible to everyone except TEG and me. So she's been recommended for services—not just speech therapy, but also possibly occupational therapy to help with the shyness.

This is all good news. But as a mother, of course, it's hard not to feel that I've failed her. We've been working on all this for so long-the shyness, the speech, but I just couldn't help her. And of course, I start questioning every decision—have I been too lenient? Not lenient enough? Does she remember those days in NICU, and not feel sufficiently bonded with me? Did I eat too much tuna while pregnant? You get the idea.

So, I've been a trifle blue the past few days. This has been compounded by the weather—I have SAD and it's been consistently gray for over a week. And my loneliness—I feel like I AM loneliness lately, and people have to recoil to protect themselves from my contagion.

And just forget the writing. Why did I sign up for Nanowrimo 2007? Oy.

Last night, as I went to bed, I was worrying all of these issues around like beads on a mental string. Thoroughly worn, I did something I have not done in a while. I prayed...just a simple request for relief. “I just want something good to happen.”

Well, today, I went to check my mail and there it was. A Laini's Lady and Not for Robots pin! Just a little treat from one of favorite people.

So, thank you, Universe. That is EXACTLY what I meant.

Now I'll be getting out of my own head and helping my Madam in anyway I can.

PS: Please excuse any misspellings or weirdness in this post--I have scratched my retina (I think) and so I can only see out of one eye--barely. :(

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Bullets and Awards

Writing that last post about decision making was more emotional than I could have anticipated. I've always laughed it off, this indecisive nature of mine, nodding ruefully at TEG's and my family's gentle (and not so gentle) ribbing. But it BOTHERS me, this distrust of my own desires. When I spend the better part of an afternoon fretting about the best way to make use of an Amazon gift certificate (an activity which should be FUN, damn it!), then I know this is something larger than just a joke.

That post, and your responses, have forced me to think about it, and more importantly, to think about ways to work through it and change it. So, as always, thank you.
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Stealing from the best isn't really thievery...it's more like an homage. So, here is my homage to the bullet point posting style that Phantom Scribbler uses.

• You would think that after the emotional pummeling I received last month when my parents came to visit, that I might be alittle hesitant to see them again so soon. And you would be right. And yet, in two short weeks, the Madam and I will be winging our way to South Florida to see them again. And my whole family. Wish me serenity.
• Yes, Madam is speaking now. Just single words, but OH, how much less frustrating our lives are! I ask her what she wants to play with, she says, "'ide" for slide and everything is wonderful!
• Not to mention, hearing her say mama is...well, it's indescribable.
• But weaning is still nothing but a pipe dream.
• Or it would be, if I were sleeping.
• I have decided to speak to myself as though I were a really good friend of mine for the week.
• I realized that if I had a close friend whose husband was working about 100 hours a week or so, and she was tending a toddler about the same amount of time, I probably wouldn't yell at her because she wasn't working on her novel.
• That being said, I have been working on mine. Well, does thinking count? I've decided the tortoise is a beautiful and underrated animal.

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Thanks to Crystal King and Tammy Vitale for awarding me a Rockin Blogger Award and a Blogger Reflection Award, respectively. I'm honored...thank you!

I need to pick five bloggers to pass on each award. To make it more challenging, I've decided not to allow myself to pick bloggers I've already awarded in the past.



When I Finally Decided to Get it: Tori consistently inspires me with her open spirit. It's like she is EATING life, which definitely rocks.


Marvelous Madness: Alexandra is busy studying and living, so she's not posting as much as she used to, and I am sure I am not alone is saying that I miss her unique, beautiful spirit, and her fabulous (literally, as she has an amazing imagination) posts. Come back, Alexandra!

Earnest and Game: This one is cheating, a little bit. Heather is a dear friend in life, and thus I can personally vouch for the fact that the witty, erudite voice she uses on her posts IS in fact the way she speaks. Which rocks.

Bohemian Mom: Because have you SEEN her dioramas illustrating scenes from her favorite horror movies? And have you read her fun, hopeful posts? She, well, rocks.

Creative Everyday: Leah's art is simply gorgeous and her posts never fail to make me think...

Which leads me to the Blogger Reflection Awards:



Bub and Pie: Her fertile mind can make connections between even the most incongruous topics. I always feel like I've gotten a delightful brain massage when I read her posts.

The Silent K: She turns her life's experiences into alchemy. Krista's words resonate long after I've read them.

Be Alive Believe Be You: Melba's experiencing what can only be described as a total life awakening and her excitement and thoughts are contagious

Frida's Notebook: Even in the midst of her important, difficult work, her writing glows with soul and beauty.

Mother Words-Mothers Who Write: Kate is what I aspire to be--a mother who can use her entire life to create beautiful works of writing. She expands my ideas of what is possible for a mother-writer.

And because I can't help but break the rules slightly, here are three people I COULD NOT leave off this list:

The Believing Soul: Amber is the reason these types of posts exist. She gets into the depths of her life, and imbues it with faith and meaning.

Simply Wait: Patry Francis is living the dream now, sure, but she's always been an amazing, generous writer--she can't help herself.

Phantom Scribbler: It doesn't matter WHAT she is writing about--the woman can WRITE, and her words never fail to make me see things a different way.

So, there you go! My awards. And phew, I'm tired.

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Friday Frivolity

This has been a tough week, with Madam not feeling that well. We stayed in a lot and I can feel my thoughts becoming wary and inbred as a result. Also, I've been watching the news, and feeling the weight of the world's ills to such an extent that I want to scoop Madam up and clutch her to my chest, forever.

I need some fun. And when I think fun, I think India.

I always have difficulty in writing about India--my love for it perhaps entwined throughout the words of languages I don't speak. So I won't try (again). Instead, I'll share a snippet of a song that has always brought me joy--capturing a hint of that vibrant energy. Consider it a vacation--surround yourself with swirling silk, put on your best jewelry, and DANCE.

Click below. You won't be sorry.

Happy Friday!

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An appreciation

The Quilting Bee by Grandma Moses

Isolation is the dream killer--Barbara Sher

“What are you looking for?” TEG asked me curiously as he saw me spending endless amounts of time online. I shook my head, not quite knowing how to answer that question. I was at loose ends in my life, having just left Cool but Aimless job without a new job or a plan(yeah, won’t be doing THAT again). I looked towards the internet as a way to search for a solution, a new job, direction. So I searched for tips--resume tips, cover letter tips, career search tips. It was a time to be hardnosed, a paragon of practicality.

I didn’t want to admit that I was searching for something more elusive. Inspiration lurking in binary code, perhaps, or encoded in HTML.

During that time, I spent a good deal of my day diligently reading, convincing myself that I would find the Answer, and stuffing any errant creative longings down where they couldn’t be able to hurt me or anyone else.

It was a lonely, isolated time. I didn’t feel like I had anything to contribute to, well, anyone. So I steeped in information, passively, and ignored the way that it made me almost desperately bored. Everyone else’s work was polished to a high sheen, no seams visible.

Moving to California just deepened that sense that I was sitting this round out. Now I was pregnant--moving slower, these strange sensations inside of me making me feel like an alien to myself. And full of foreboding that I wouldn’t be able to be a good mother, not when I had made such a mess of my own life. So the search continued, only this time, I was on the lookout for anything that could help mold me into a Good Mother. And again, everyone else was an expert, and all I could do was be meticulous and take good notes. Surely, I had nothing to say about this experience. My imagination was stymied by the sheer force of the informed opinions around me. I knew nothing.

Madam arrived and I drowned in her. When that tidal wave subsided, however, I was surprised to find that those nagging longings hadn’t gone away; in fact, they had intensified. My surfing became even more fitful, dissatisfied.

I’m not sure why I clicked on that crafty link that day. I’ve never really been interested in any of that, even though I’d had Wish Jar Journals bookmarked for a while. But every time I clicked on it, I felt my throat closing up with envy--she was an Artist, another expert brimming with esoteric knowledge and proud authority.

In hindsight, I guess I was scared to read it too closely.

But that one link led to another, and another. I found a whole community of women making their art a central theme in their life. A paradox--they took their work seriously (something I’ve always been afraid to do) and took themselves less so (allowing themselves to make messes and mistakes and enjoying them--wait, you can do that?). I found mothers mulling about ways to remember ideas and create in the in between times--nap times, bed times. I saw work evolve over time, the dailyness of the “how to be an artist” question being answered everyday. Enthusiasm was everywhere--weekly projects, monthly projects--and insights and praise were shared generously. I learned that knowing nothing was as good a place to start as any.

And for the first time, it felt wrong to stay silent. I couldn’t just sit back and allow myself to be entertained by the Experts anymore. These seams were visible. This work was possible.

So thank you all, for practically forcing my voice out of my strangled throat, for being open and honest with your art, your questions, your answers, your process, for showing me your imperfections. Thank you for dwelling in possibilities.

If TEG were to ask me “What are you looking for?” now, I would have a clear answer.

I was looking for you.

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The shadownet

I don’t know if it’s because I’m a little sister, or an unfortunately cautious person, but I always seem to get into something just as it’s coming to an end. When I was younger, all I wanted was to be a hippie, like the ones in Hair, one of my favorite movies growing up. Unfortunately, it was the 80s. Not that I didn’t see the possibility of being cool even in the 80s. My sister would go off to Danceteria and wear safety pins in her ears and generally be as punk as she could get away and still go to church with us on Sunday. But...I was too young for that as well (thought wearing safety pins to class made me a VERY cool fifth grader, thanks to that same sister).

This is my roundabout way to noticing that last week seems to have brought out the dark side of the sunny little corner of the web I usually inhabit. I feel a little like an exuberant kid with my new toy blog, getting to the playground just as Mary Ann and Jennifer had a fight over a Barbie and everyone took sides and then all left in a snit. Or something. Maybe, again, I got here too late.

I think part of the difficulty stems from the false intimacy that these sites can engender in their readers. I started reading blogs back when I was at Aimless but Cool Job--to me, they satisfied the same need soap operas did for a time, i.e. an intimate look at someone else’s life and thoughts. People routinely post pictures of their family, deep dark secrets, and the ever-popular stories about poop. You pick the people you “follow”, just like on a soap opera, and then you cheer with them at the conclusion of a journey or commiserate over a failure. But that’s where the similarity ends, because unlike with a television show, you can actually talk to these people--develop a relationship with the “star”. Like it or not, you start to feel emotionally involved, and that can lead to feeling, if not like friends, then at least “friendly”. And so you start to feel like you can demand things from them...why aren’t they responding to your comments anymore? Or replying to your blog? You have been a faithful fan...where is your payoff? It’s not enough to get entertainment from the site...now it has to validate you in some way as well.

In Jungian psychology, the shadow represents the aspects of your persona that you have deemed unacceptable, for some reason, so you foist them onto the outside world. So instead of admitting that you feel unpopular or “less than”, or are jealous of those bloggers who have huge followings, you attack them for being too...what? Confident, popular, eloquent, lucky? The shadow knows.

Jealousy can be a wonderful, laser pinpoint tool to discover what it is you really want, and really need...as long as you face up to it. A lot of the time, I have a hard time admitting to myself that I actually really want something--perhaps from a fear that it will forever be out of my reach. But persistent jealousy acts as an insidious little acid voice inside forcing me to look at what I am doing, or not doing, with what I know. A willful blindness to oneself is like being divorced from your intuition. You stumble along down one rotted path after another.

But it’s not all gloom. We also tend to stuff positive aspects of ourselves in the shadow...traits we either don’t REALLY believe we possess, or those that scare us because they seem to demand a change in our whole lives. But again, we have to accept it, and again, it’s the starkness of our jealousy that can show us the way. To loosely paraphrase Emerson, it’s as though our own rejected qualities come back to us with a certain alienated majesty.

So...own the fact that you want more attention and support from the internets (or any, ahem). Own that you’d love to have enough of a belief in your abilities to call yourself “Gorgeous and Divine” and REALLY mean it. Own that you care enough about your blog, your writing, your art, your work, or your life to wish you could rise to a level of brilliance, but are afraid of the work involved, or afraid that at the end of that work, you'll be left with the knowledge that it wasn't enough. Because the messy, occasionally malodorous effects of wanting more and being angry at those who seemingly possess it? That is the open stuff of life and connection. But the closed-eyed, closed-minded fist of self-righteousness? Not so much.

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